Trophies of God's Grace
We have a lot of fun being married. People often ask about the "secret" or what we attribute our experience to. The truth is, it would be robbery to say anything other than grace. We'd be robbing God of the trophy of His power, kindness and purpose played out in our lives, our marriage.
We met the freshman year of college in Chicago. We were both attending Trinity International University, with some overlapping courses the first semester. We struck up a friendship out of convenience - Mike was working 2-3 jobs while going to school so he had no time for a relationship and was skeptical about the prospect of even pursuing one; Jacqui had a high school boyfriend out of state, thus "unavailable." Within a few weeks we were studying together, running errands and finding we thoroughly enjoyed each others company. By the end of the semester something was developing and neither of us were sure what to do about it. Jacqui broke the ice and we had our first "DTR" (define the relationship) discussion...6 hours worth in the school cafeteria at the start of finals week!
Our relationship was unlikely to say the least. A guy from Alaska on a bullet train for vocational ministry, fully intending to not even entertain a relationship until grad school (if ever). A girl from Iowa, not even sure why she was attending a school far from home and family tradition, with a long-term relationship waiting back home. Both of us came from homes marked by divorce and various forms of dysfunction. Early on in the relationship Mike told Jacqui, "What makes you think we'll work out any better than our family trees? I don't think we're any more sincere, any more in love, any more intent on being happy together - yet look where so many of our family members ended up! What's going to make us different?"
That question, the realization that maybe - just maybe - we didn't have intuition, instincts or the right answers to do marriage successfully was the genesis of a journey towards bliss. We began to read, discuss, seek out wise counsel, and invite God to reform our paradigm of marriage. Why settle for surviving, what would it look like for a marriage to be a source of joy and strength for two people seeking to serve God with their lives? What would it look like to aim not for "better than most" but a "let's be that old couple who makes teenagers at the mall feel queasy because they really like each other!"
So after a few months Mike popped the question. On a stormy afternoon at sunset on Lake Forest Beach in Illinois he knelt down and asked Jacqui to spend the rest of her life with him. She said yes (key part of the story). That was October 12, 2001. 7 months later they were married on May 4, 2002 at the Village Church of Lincolnshire to an audience of family and friends from Trinity.
From an early time we were teased as being the "house of marital bliss" because of how ridiculously happy we seemed. It kind of stuck. We'd begin to answer the phone jokingly as "House of Marital Bliss, how may I help you?" Pretty quick we decided the label used in jest was actually what we'd love to become...why not be the House of Marital Bliss?
Years later we've found that as trophies of God's amazing grace, not only has He established in us a marriage neither of us could have imagined - but he allows us to be encouragers of others on their relationship journey. We've come to know so well that marriage is just another crucible of discipleship, of being formed into the likeness of Jesus, a revealing of our willingness to depend upon Christ and reflect His glory in the context of a human relationship. What a crazy mystery that God intends for our relationship to be a human manifestation of the love Jesus has for the Church and visa-versa!
So, 2 folks from legacies of divorce, a generation of apathy, a society of dysfunction have discovered that by God's grace we can live this life in a House of Marital Bliss. We like it.
Don't settle for less, folks. There's richness and mystery in the journey. It's worth it.
That's the short version of our story at least!
Mike & Jacqui
We met the freshman year of college in Chicago. We were both attending Trinity International University, with some overlapping courses the first semester. We struck up a friendship out of convenience - Mike was working 2-3 jobs while going to school so he had no time for a relationship and was skeptical about the prospect of even pursuing one; Jacqui had a high school boyfriend out of state, thus "unavailable." Within a few weeks we were studying together, running errands and finding we thoroughly enjoyed each others company. By the end of the semester something was developing and neither of us were sure what to do about it. Jacqui broke the ice and we had our first "DTR" (define the relationship) discussion...6 hours worth in the school cafeteria at the start of finals week!
Our relationship was unlikely to say the least. A guy from Alaska on a bullet train for vocational ministry, fully intending to not even entertain a relationship until grad school (if ever). A girl from Iowa, not even sure why she was attending a school far from home and family tradition, with a long-term relationship waiting back home. Both of us came from homes marked by divorce and various forms of dysfunction. Early on in the relationship Mike told Jacqui, "What makes you think we'll work out any better than our family trees? I don't think we're any more sincere, any more in love, any more intent on being happy together - yet look where so many of our family members ended up! What's going to make us different?"
That question, the realization that maybe - just maybe - we didn't have intuition, instincts or the right answers to do marriage successfully was the genesis of a journey towards bliss. We began to read, discuss, seek out wise counsel, and invite God to reform our paradigm of marriage. Why settle for surviving, what would it look like for a marriage to be a source of joy and strength for two people seeking to serve God with their lives? What would it look like to aim not for "better than most" but a "let's be that old couple who makes teenagers at the mall feel queasy because they really like each other!"
So after a few months Mike popped the question. On a stormy afternoon at sunset on Lake Forest Beach in Illinois he knelt down and asked Jacqui to spend the rest of her life with him. She said yes (key part of the story). That was October 12, 2001. 7 months later they were married on May 4, 2002 at the Village Church of Lincolnshire to an audience of family and friends from Trinity.
From an early time we were teased as being the "house of marital bliss" because of how ridiculously happy we seemed. It kind of stuck. We'd begin to answer the phone jokingly as "House of Marital Bliss, how may I help you?" Pretty quick we decided the label used in jest was actually what we'd love to become...why not be the House of Marital Bliss?
Years later we've found that as trophies of God's amazing grace, not only has He established in us a marriage neither of us could have imagined - but he allows us to be encouragers of others on their relationship journey. We've come to know so well that marriage is just another crucible of discipleship, of being formed into the likeness of Jesus, a revealing of our willingness to depend upon Christ and reflect His glory in the context of a human relationship. What a crazy mystery that God intends for our relationship to be a human manifestation of the love Jesus has for the Church and visa-versa!
So, 2 folks from legacies of divorce, a generation of apathy, a society of dysfunction have discovered that by God's grace we can live this life in a House of Marital Bliss. We like it.
Don't settle for less, folks. There's richness and mystery in the journey. It's worth it.
That's the short version of our story at least!
Mike & Jacqui